::swimmin'::

Yesterday was my mom's birthday, and also swimmin' Saturday (part of our last week of school acivities-more on that later). So we decided to combine the 2. We all got together here...

That's the barn. It's Uncle Kerry's (Papa Kitty's brother) & Aunt Eunice's house. Their pool is SO much fun! There are cliffs, slides, a hot tub, waterfalls, all kinds of fun stuff!!






The cliff was pretty scary! It's gotta be about 10 feet up from the water. We all took turns talking ourselves into jumping off. I only did it once. It took me a few minutes to actually do it. I was scared. Matt did it a few times, so did Papa and Billy. Chloe did it about a million times! Such a tiny girl on such a big cliff!!




(Grandma & BeeAva played together a lot. She fed her and dipped her feet in the water. She liked the baby pool best. It was quieter and not deep.)


(The baby pool. Isn't it great? Bubb liked it and the hot tub best)


(water cannons)


(Portie didn't want to jump off the big cliff, so he jumped off the rocks. Bubb liked the black slide. A lot.)

We all had lunch @ Shakey's (a pizza buffet in American Fork) before swimming. It was pretty good. We gave Grandma a sparkly purse and a little compact mirror. She loved it. The purse is a little crazy, but Chloe insisted that we get that one for Grandma-because she's fancy. Grandma likes it. She said she'd take it to work on Monday. After all our swimming, we got ice cream and called it a day.

Happy Birthday, Grandma! We sure love you!
(and tell Uncle Kerry & Aunt Eunice thanks for us. We sure had fun in their pool :) )

::fire::

As part of our last week of summer, we had a campfire in Mantua last night. We took dinner stuff to cook on the fire. It was good, the s'mores were delish, and the kids had a great time. They all got muddy, threw things into the fire, caught their marshmallows on fire, climbed in the trees, broke some sticks, and got dirty.

(Hot dogs for dinner. Avie (5 months) has some baby cereal :) )

And that was our Friday night.

::flag football::

Portie had his first flag football game last night.
It was HOT!

They did okay-actually they lost, but they did score a couple of times. It was kind of a mess. There were a few kids playing on his team who aren't even really ON the team. It's always a little confusing the first week. I'm sure next week will be better.

Matt is the coach. He did great! He was a little nervous because some of the rules are different than he's used to, and the kids are so little. And some (most) of the kids just don't get it. There are also lots of parents there to "help." But everything went well. I think a few more practices might help.


These pictures aren't so great. Portie is kind of behind that one kid in this one. I was having a hard time getting pictures because of Coop. He was being a little difficult. He ran onto the field once, and spent the rest of the time crying because he wanted a drink, popsicle, to eat, to go home, whatever. I was holding Ava, and we went to the concession stand a few times for drinks and popsicles, and he followed me crying that he can't walk. So I carried him. He and Ava both. It was not a fun evening with Coop.

Speaking of Cooper...
He's crying right now. He wants his binky. I told him to go find it. "I caaaaan't!!!" Then he told me to stop looking at him. " 'top lookin' at me, you Mommy!"

::huntin'::

Matt's a hunter.
A bow hunter.
He goes every August.
Has since he was a youngster.
He loves it.
Like a kid on Christmas.

It's all a big ordeal. Lots of packing, shopping,debate (when to leave, who's going, who's driving what, what food to take, how long to stay, how to pack the trucks, when to come home, how many arrows to take, when are we going to Cabela's?, where's my camo? etc etc), unpacking, cleaning, etc.

This year was a particularly special one though because Matt & J drew out on a limited entry hunt. Which basically means only a few people in the state get these tags that say you can hunt in a special area, aka San Juan, aka "where the big ones are!"

In the days leading up to the hunt, we spend a lot of time in Mantua (his mom & dad's) getting stuff ready. The packing of the trucks happens the day before they leave, and it's usually pretty funny. The definition of the saying "too many chiefs and no Indians" or the too many cooks in the kitchen one would work too. Either way, it's funny. The little boys enjoyed it too. They played on the 4 wheelers a lot. A lot of "wehm, wehm, WHEM" noises. It was pretty cute.




They were planning on going from Thursday to Thursday, so they needed a LOT of gas(oline).


Finally they got done loading the trucks. And they left.
Bubb & Port were very sad. They missed Da-da all week. Every time the door would open, doorbell rang, garage door opened, they thought it was Da-da. They asked me everyday when Da was coming home. All of them, well, not Ava, but the other 3 would just randomly say "I miss Dad." It was kind of sad. A week is a long time when you're little.



He was gone for 6 days. He shot his deer on Tuesday, and got home late Wednesday. We missed him. We're glad he's back.

He wants SO much to take those little boys with him. He was talking about it A LOT this year. He kept saying how he can't wait 'til they're old enough to go, and they can camp and ride the 4 wheelers together. He's so excited for that. It's pretty sweet. He'll probably take Portie next year.

Anyway, he was gone and now he's home.
And we're glad.
:)

In other news...
Remember how I wasn't ready for school and Fall yet? NOT ANYMORE!!! Probably due in part to the fact that I was flying solo with 4 kids for a week (it really wasn't too bad, but we had our moments). We did our back to school stuff, met the teachers, started flag football (which always makes me feel Fall-ish), watching Fall-ish kid shows , AND it's been insanely hot this last week.
Bring. On. The. Fall.

Also...
I miss the Tahoe! We sold it so we can get a bigger car. Uncle Bob's workin' hard to find us one. So in the meantime, we're driving our old commuter car (with no a/c) and Matt's mom & dad's old commuter car (with no a/c). Not fun. We can't all fit in one car, so any time we go somewhere, we have to take 2 cars. Also the no a/c thing is pretty miserable.

::gateway & b2s::

Since Dad was visiting, we all got together on Saturday for a splash at the Gateway and some lunch at Z Tejas.

The 7 grandkids...

(Tristan-4 1/2, Cooper 2 1/2, Chloe-7 1/2, Ava-5 mos, Mia-18 mos, Liam-6, Porter-5)






Glad we all got together. A fun time was had by all.

In other news...
We went to back to school night for Porter and intake conference for Chloe. Chloe's teacher is really nice, and she's pretty excited (and also nervous) for school on Monday. We walked all around her BIG new school. Her teacher said there were over 600 kids there! It's big-makes her mother a little nervous. We get to buy some school supplies for her this year (in years past, the school provided most of the supplies). So that's exciting. I feel like there will be lots of pink Barbie things, and a huge box of crayons. Portie's back to school night was cute. He's SO excited about going to kindergarten. We drove past his preschool yesterday, and he said "There's my old school! Finally I'm no more baby school!" We met his teacher. She seems really nice. I hope he will like her. He got a different teacher than Chloe had-which is good. Chloe's kindergarten teacher was a great teacher, but I just think Port needs somebody who will be really fun and happy and nice so he'll really want to go every day. He was so excited to be in his classroom. He was running all around it, touching stuff, looking at stuff. We got to see the class list, and noticed a few familiar names on there. He'll get to have Kelton and Gavin from preschool in his class, so we're pretty excited about that. I have to say that I'm pretty nervous. Especially for Porter. I remember being pretty nervous for Chloe, but I think I'm a little more nervous for Port. I hope he likes it, I hope he's nice to the kids (he always is), I hope the kids are nice to him, I hope he makes friends, I hope he's okay on the bus. I'm sure everything will be fine...I'm just nervous. He's such a sweet boy. He's sometimes a little crazy and not so nice at home, but he's always been good at school. I'm still nervous though. My sweet baby Portie!

Also...
While we were at Port's school, we had to drop in and see Mrs. C (Chloe's first grade teacher). Chloe was SO happy to see her. She got sick the last 2 days of school, so she didn't get to tell her a proper goodbye or get a picture with her or anything! So we got one last night.

I kind of love her too! I hope Portie gets her for first grade-and so does he. Chloe said she was the best teacher she ever had (which is funny because other than preschool, she's only had 2 teachers). It made me think of all my teachers I've had. I remember their names from kindergarten all the way to 8th grade. Some stick out in your mind, some made a big impression on you. Mrs. C is one of those teachers :)

::softball::

Chloe played her last softball game (machine pitch) last night. She did pretty great!

(Portie & Bubb on the bleachers-yes he's playing with a plunger. It's a clean one-never been "used." Mario is a plumber. 'Nuff said. Chloe's team getting their field assignments.)



(She played 3rd base the whole game. She did awesome!)



(She batted twice & got on base twice-Great job Chloe!)


(She's the cutest dang runner! She got around all the bases both times)



(She didn't score in this photo. She didn't have a chance-the catcher already had the ball. She did score a run though her next time out.)



(post game cheers, and both teams running the bases)

It was kind of a long season, but really fun! She had her ups and downs-some weeks she'd do really awesome, and others she wouldn't even get on base. So on the good weeks she says "I love softball, I'm going to play it every year! I wish I could play again tomorrow. Maybe I'll play every sport there is: softball, baseball, basketball, what else is there??" etc The bad weeks were "I HATE SOFTBALL, WHY'D YOU MAKE ME PLAY THIS DUMB GAME, I DIDN'T EVEN WANNA PLAY!!! YOU MADE ME!!" etc etc. So that was fun. But it really was fun to watch her. She usually had a couple of practices a week, and improved a lot throughout the summer. She wants to play again next year-so that's good.



On a side note...
Papa Guitar happened to be visiting us for a couple of days, so he got to come to her game. It was fun to have him with us. I think he liked going to her game. She was excited to have him there. After her game, we took the kids over to the playground where this lady kept hittin' on my dad! She kept saying "I can't believe he's their grandpa! He doesn't look old enough to have 7 grandkids. I just can't believe it! I thought these kids were his" Oh man!! It was huh-larious!!!!